UP: 16-year-old gangrape survivor beaten up by police

Bijnor: Barely a week after a minor rape victim was detained in a lock-up in Uttar Pradesh, a 16-year-old gangrape victim on Tuesday claimed she was beaten up by police when she went with her parents to file a complaint.

Three police personnel - SHO of Afzalgarh police station Ramji Lal, Sub-Inspector Raj Singh and female constable Sukhraj Kaur - have been suspended after the incident in Bijnor, police said. The two rape accused, against whom the victim and her parents went to lodge a complaint, have been arrested, they said.

The incident comes barely a week after a minor rape victim was detained in a lock-up in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh.

The victim from Rasoolpur village alleged that two youths - Anis and Rashid - had gangraped her on April 11. When she, along with her parents, had gone to Afzalgarh police station the next day to lodge a report against them, the police officials misbehaved with her parents and beat her, the victim claimed.

Taking note of the incident, SP Sunil Chandra Bajpai reached Afzalgarh police station on Monday and got the FIR registered against the accused, who were later arrested. He also ordered suspension of the three police personnel in this regard.

A 10-year-old rape victim was put in a lock-up in a Mahila Thana in Bulandshahr on April 7 when she had approached them to file a complaint along with her mother. Though the UP police suspended two women constables in this connection, the incident drew Supreme Court's ire which directed the state government to file response within a week on detention of the rape victim.

"A minor cannot be put in lock up," a bench headed by Chief Justice Altamas Kabir said on Monday while expressing displeasure over the incident.